Please join these groups inworld by clicking Edit -> Search -> Groups:

"First They Came For..."

"BDSM is Safe - BDSM is not Abuse"

"I am for a Free Second Life"

"National Coalition for Sexual Freedom"

FORUMS & DISCUSSION BOARDS

SL Insider

SL Forum

SL Universe

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SL Drama

Yet Another SL Forum

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VOICE-ALTERING SOFTWARE

Voice Changer 3.0

Voice Changers

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Voice Changer Software

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COPYRIGHT ISSUES

Sep 15 2009 -- SL Sued for Allowing Sale of Imposter Goods -- mediapost

Sep 15 2009 -- Eros vs Linden, Complete Class Action Complaint -- Second Life Herald

BROADLY OFFENSIVE CONTENT

"First They Came For..." -- Wikipedia

May 31 2007 -- Keeping SL "Safe", Rape / Graphic Violence, Broadly Offensive Content -- Daniel Linden

June 7 2007 -- Interview with Precursor, Comments -- Second Life Herald

June 6 2007 -- Conversation with Robin Linden, Comments -- United Protest

June 2 2007 -- Home page Hypocrisy -- PixelPulse

June 1 2007 -- Our World Our Rules, Huge Links List to Related Articles -- SecondLifeInsider

June 1 2007 -- Spy Thy Neighbor -- Metaverse

June 4 2007 -- Seven Little Words, Policy change, Families de France, American Civil Liberties Union, National Coalition for Sexual Freedom -- Broccoli Curry

June 2007? -- Blurring the Boundaries, Real Laws & Virtual Worlds, German TV report -- AJDown

May 31 2007 -- List of Thought Crimes, Comments - PixelPulse

May 31 2007 -- Keeping SL "Safe", Rape / Graphic Violence, Broadly Offensive Content -- Daniel Linden

SEXUAL-AGEPLAY ISSUE

Explanation/Definition of Non-Sexual Ageplay and Sexual Ageplay -- Wikipedia

May 22 2007 -- Child Avatars no longer findable for Non-Sexual Ageplay (see comments) -- PixelPulse

May 13 2007 -- Translation of the Misleading German TV Report -- PixelPulse

May 10 2007 -- Child Pornography Investigation -- ZDNet

May 9 2007 -- Accusations re Child Pornography -- Robin Linden

May 2007: Editor's note: Ageplay is now a blocked term in all SL Search categories, even though nonsexual ageplay is not at issue.  The term "ageplay" has also been blocked for searching the blog of official SL announcements, so such a search comes up zero even though there are SL announcements in existence specifically about ageplay.

April 12 2006 -- Phony Kids, Virtual Sex -- CNET

March 8 2007 -- State Your Adult Age, & Don't Openly Promote (sexual? or even nonsexual? unclear) -- Duncan Rust, roleplayer

Explanation/Definition of Non-Sexual Ageplay and Sexual Ageplay -- Wikipedia

SL has always required that explicit adult content be indoors only : 

"In Mature regions, Residents can be free to engage in more adult activity and language, though of course, explicit adult content must be contained behind 'closed doors'." -- source webpage

LAND-PARCEL COURT CASE

June 1 2007 -- Judge Rules against Terms of Service -- Gamasutra

May 31 2007 -- Second Life in Court, Terms of Service ruled Unconscionable -- Broccoli Curry

COPYRIGHT and SECOND LIFE

April 15 2007 -- Video of Daniel Linden, Comments -- SLCreativity (backup link to video)

Survey of Visitors at the Bondage Ranch (this survey occurred before the verification system was implemented)

June 4 2007 -- Sued by Moralist Group -- SLPixelPost

May 27 2007 -- Verification Details, Comments -- PixelPulse

May 17 2007 -- User-Generated Censorship -- Metaverse

May 13 2007 -- Concerns about Land Flagging -- PixelPost

May 12 2007 -- Verification Roundup, Comments -- SecondLifeInsider

May 12 2007 -- Kidding Ourselves?, Interesting Comments -- Information Week

May 10 2007 -- Further Clarification -- Robin Linden

May 9 2007 -- Verification Hits a Bump -- Reuters

May 9 2007 -- Debate is Raging -- Progress & Freedom Foundation

May 7 2007 -- Identity Thieves Celebrate -- Information Week

May 7 2007 -- More on Identity Verification -- Daniel Linden

May 4 2007 -- LL Lays Down Law, Roman Orgy Meets Sesame Street -- Clickable Culture

May 4 2007 -- Age & Identity Verification -- Daniel Linden

PRIVACY

May 8 2007 -- Voice-Morphing Sample Available -- PixelPulse

April 7 2007 -- TG Residents Brace for Voice -- PixelPulse

I discussed the current confusion on Second Life about their policy regarding BDSM with Daniel Linden on Tuesday. He confirmed that Second Life's policies haven't changed, and they don't intend to police their users or forbid BDSM communities within Second Life. The reason they can't say what's allowed right now is that they're currently researching international laws (since Second Life has a large international presence) and he asked for NCSF's help with that. We have a great deal of experience dealing with obscenity laws, particularly here in the US with our challenge to obscenity laws on the Internet which went to the Supreme Court. We also have contact with overseas advocacy groups which have experience with other nations' obscenity laws.

Second Life doesn't want to create a laundry list of activities that are acceptable and those that aren't, which I agree with. Instead we'll work with Second Life to help create an umbrella policy similar to safe, sane and consensual, as applied to the Internet. I will work directly with Second Life groups and lands who have contacted NCSF to ensure that our suggestions are workable for users. As an example of Internet ssc: ie, activities must be consensual, in that you have to announce if sexual slavery or kidnapping is allowed in your land, and avatars aren't ambushed in other places or exposed to activities they haven't agreed to; safe, in that you can remove your avatar if you change your mind; and sane, in that people understand the difference between fantasy and reality, ie. severe harm to an avatar is allowed in SL but not to a real life person.

Second Life intends for their users to be responsible for their own content, however US law is extremely strict when it comes to portrayals of child sex. Second Life must enforce "no sex with child-sized avatars" because the US will prosecute them for it since their servers are located here. Even though Second Lifers are engaging in age play between consenting adults (which is legal), once you translate that into any sort of text or images (even cartoony images or stick figures) then that representation is considered to be child porn according to Federal law. SL participants who don't like that will have to contact their congressperson and senators to change US child porn laws. International users must understand that there are certain laws that Second Life must abide by, or the entire company can be shut down. There are numerous examples of Internet companies and private websites that have been closed because of these sorts of violations.

As I said, I will stay in close touch with Second Life users to ensure that any suggestions that are made regarding policy are acceptable and workable for you. Feel free to distribute this within Second Life. Anyone with comments or suggestions can contact me directly and I will make sure your concerns are heard.

Susan
Spokesperson
National Coalition for Sexual Freedom

Please remember:

You all have joined a protesting group to voice yourself for freedom of expression, sexuality, respect, tolerance and freedom. First of all, alone that action is sign of bravery, honor and dedication to a cause many people in history have pledged their lives to, and keep doing so this very minute, and probably many decades to come.

What we want to promote in the groups under "United Protest" (so far being 'BDSM is Safe - BDSM is not Abuse'; 'I am for a FREE Second Life'; 'The National Coalition for Sexual Freedom'; 'SecondVoices'; 'Ladies in self bondage' and 'SL Society for Expressive Freedom') is a PEACEFUL PROTEST.

A peaceful protest in our eyes means you can recruit as many people as possible for the cause, you can express yourself by wearing items of protest with preferrably /positive/ messages conveying our goal: SL being a free environment for all residents no matter their personal morals, values, sexual preferences and opinions. Also organizing events that do not harm the SL grid in any way.

We know you are angry, and so are we. But anger will get us nowhere. Anger is like hot coals you want to throw at someone: your hand gets burned, and you miss because you're only hurting yourself (ofcourse some you of get off on pain, or you have such a high painlimit it barely hurts, but you get the picture :P).
With aggressive actions, you're not only hurting yourself because LL may find you 'griefing' or 'offensive', you would also hurt the cause by lowering credibility drastically.

As a group we need to make sure LindenLabs is willing to communicate. For that we need credibility. Disruptive behaviour like going into Linden Regions and 'grief', negative messages, and display of anger will only decrease credibility, and with that the possibility to communicate. We urge you to refrain from aggressive and disruptive protest, and instead focus on opening communication and get into a dialogue with LL in which they will take us seriously and value us. We base our protest on arguments and voices, not sticks and stones.

We all consider ourselves responsible adults, let's make sure LL sees us as such, and will be happy to listen to us.

Again, thank you ALL so much for your support, courage to stand up, and positive engagement. YOU make it happen. Keep up the good work!

~Jazhara
June 3, 2007

So you want to keep Second Life FREE as well? AWESOME!!

This poster is a protest to Linden Labs blogpost on May 31, that can be found here: 
>>> http://blog.secondlife.com/2007/05/31/keeping-second-life-safe-together/ <<<
(the text of this post is also included at the bottom of this note)

Already know what this is about? Scroll down to see what you can do to join the PEACEFUL protest.

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Don't know what this is all about? Read on:

Linden Labs seems to be forced in one or more ways to censor the residents of Second Life. Censorship is for many people a reason to try to escape Real Life, and live their fantasies in Second Life. And now Second Life seems to become more than an extension of Real Life. It's becoming the same as Real Life through censorship, and thus remains no reason for MANY residents to log on anymore, since they can't do what they want anymore.

Linden Labs has put the "BAD" label on ageplay, bestiality, violence, explicit sex and other "broadly offensive content", and is asking it's residents to Abuse Report anything that could be perceived as being "offensive".
Since we all have different morals, values and standards, this means eventually ANYONE is subject to investigation, censorship and possible removal from Second Life. By asking it's residents to file Abuse Reports on "offensive" content, Linden Labs is turning into Big Brother. Remember the book/movie 1984? Remember Germany between 1939 and 1945? Residents with values and morals that differ from a so-called "majority" are getting labeled by moralknights that find that /their/ values and morals should count for the whole world.

RESPECT, TOLERANCE AND FREEDOM are key to a happy life, be it Real Life or Second Life. Real Life, for many of Second Life's residents, doesn't offer that and is for them a reason to be in Second Life. And now Second life seems to turn into an even worse environment. When will it stop? When can you and I live the life we want to without being judged, critisized and expelled?

But that's not all...
Not only will this affect YOU, it will also effect SL as a whole. Many content creators already stopped building content for Second Life. Not only are creators of explicit content that is "potentially offensive" threatened with a ban, ALL content creators are endangered with loss of income because Second Life's popularity will drop drastically as soon as "explicit content" will be censored. Eventually, this can and will lead to poor content in Second Life, islands will be closed off or cancelled, and it wouldn't be strange if the mainland would decrease in size as well, since people don't feel free to act like they want, do as they want, think like they want, make what they want and BE who they want!

You may not approve of ageplay, rape, bestiality, explicit violence and other 'offensive' fantasies that one can live here in Second Life. And that's fine, we all have our likes and dislikes. You won't see me playing with a child avatar, or roleplaying a dog pleasuring me, nor will I shoot one through the head for fun. That doesn't mean others can't in this VIRTUAL world. How long will it take before censorship effects YOU? This protest is not to stand up for Real Life pedophiles, rapists, violent abusers and serial killers. In Real Life those are all actions that happen NON-CONSENSUALLY. In Second Life, these acts happen between responsible, CONSENTING adults, and 90% of the time even in complete privacy, and the other 10% in regions that are designed to live those fantasies CONSENSUALLY. (How the hell can one actually rape someone in SL anyway? lmfao!)

Linden Labs wants Second Life to be Safe. Well...
Dear Linden Labs, Second Life is as safe as it gets. One has to be an adult to be a resident here, and be responsible as one. It is not your job to take on responsibility for our actions. We all have the power to choose and we can very much decide to consent or not. We don't need you to babysit us like children. We need you to provide a free world where we can all be who and whatever we want to be and do what we like to do, just like you promised us with your slogans and commercials. We love the world you provide, please, dear Linden Labs, keep it like that.

To quote Benjamin Franklin: "one who sacrifices freedom for security deserves neither"

You get the point, and this rant has been long enough...

==================================================

For reference, this is what Linden Labs posted recently on their blog:

Keeping Second Life Safe, Together

The diversity of things to see and do within Second Life is almost unimaginable, but our community has made it clear to us that certain types of content and activity are simply not acceptable in any form. Real-life images, avatar portrayals, and other depiction of sexual or lewd acts involving or appearing to involve children or minors; real-life images, avatar portrayals, and other depictions of sexual violence including rape, real-life images, avatar portrayals, and other depictions of extreme or graphic violence, and other broadly offensive content are never allowed or tolerated within Second Life.

Please help us to keep Second Life a safe and welcoming space by continuing to notify Linden Lab about locations in-world that are violating our Community Standards regarding broadly offensive and potentially illegal content. Our team monitors such notification 24-hours a day, seven-days a week. Individuals and groups promoting or providing such content and activities will be swiftly met with a variety of sanctions, including termination of accounts, closure of groups, removal of content, and loss of land. It’s up to all of us to make sure Second Life remains a safe and welcoming haven of creativity and social vision.

===================================================

-- Jazhara Keon
June 1, 2007

"Broadly Offensive" material, the death of SL?

As many of you know Linden Labs released a blog recently describing a crack down on various issues within second life.

In it they briefly describe things as Broadly offensive. Focusing their attention on the sexual content within second life. What is the problem with two adults of or over the age of consent within their respective country exploring -consensual sexual role play- that is not in any way shape or form illegal in nature according to the laws of the land of where Linden Labs (hence forth referred to as LL) is located?

Some people make the argument that they should not be exposed to such activities. That they find such offensive, lewd, and generally unacceptable. The beauty of second life though (at least for now) is the power of choice. If person A finds person B offensive, or acting in what they find an offensive manner they can choose to "mute" said person. Or they can teleport away from said person(s). Worse case scenario they can log out of second life for a brief moment and wait for that person to go away before logging back in. Truly there's no reason for anyone to stay near anything they find offensive in second life.

Rather what LL has created is a new form of griefing. People purposefully seeking out things that they find offensive and harassing those that were otherwise not bothering them. Already today I have been approached by three separate people threatening me against three separate issues. All of which a direct result of this blog entry. The first one was a person who went out of their way to seek me out about a consensual role playing group that I am involved with. The key word there is consensual, no one is forced to join the group, no one is forced to participate, and everyone is, to my knowledge of consenting age and all of their avatars represent consenting age or older as well.

Another person harassed me today about the BDSM / D/s lifestyle and its immoralities. As well as my choice to prefer the company of my own gender. LL What you have done is created a giant witch hunt, where now you have opened the flood gates to allow harassment of people that were not in any way affecting these extreme conservatives.

You also describe "extreme or graphic violence". Alright then, let's continue our crack down then. You want to make "Second Life safe". Sure alright, then you will need to start banning everything that makes Second Life a success right now. You will need to ban all "furry" style avatars (of which you even now have a default furry avatar) as they could be found offensive in that they can be viewed as bestiality.

You will need to ban all weapons in second life. You couldn't have swords, knives, grenades, tanks, guns, warplanes, starships, laser guns, etc etc etc, without violence, or graphic violence.

May as well crack down on everyone that enjoys the BDSM or Gorean lifestyles as well. Can't possibly have that in here either.

On top of that you should also ban all sexual activities as well. Close all strip clubs, dance clubs, and all stores and shops featuring sexual content like pose shops, beds, sex play items so on and so forth. That could be found offensive.

Whereas I fully agree that real life imagery of "sexual violence" and "graphic violence" should not be allowed in Second Life, I see nothing wrong with such things within an avatar, with as I stated above you have the choice not to be around such things.

I realise that LL will not actually read this nor will they actually read anything that the majority of the responders to the blog entry said. Yet I can hope can't I? Sexuality in second life is a key component to it where people can safely explore fantasies in a fantasy world and digital realm, with out harming anyone in the real world. Sexual content is in just about everything everywhere in second life. From the clothing that people wear, to the items that a vast majority buy.

Take this away and you will lose your second life.

Onyx Syakumi said it better than I on the 16th response to the blog entry

I encourage you to read it.

Naomi
June 2, 2007

I think it would be worth asking: what constitutes “other broadly offensive content?”

You are making some very dangerous assumptions that what the majority deems unacceptable is always fair — this is why (at least in the United States) we have a Supreme Court. It is important to defend the rights of the minority from the ignorance of the majority.

If it were the consensus of Second Life users to ban homosexuality, what would the opinion of Linden Labs be?

If it were the consensus of Second Life users that graphic violence was acceptable so long as it was directed against a homosexual, what would the opinion of Linden Labs be?

What would happen if white supremacists suddenly began using Second Life as a haven, thereby tipping the majority opinion in favor of banning avatars that appear as other races?

These are extreme examples that I hope would never come to pass, but such a decree as the one you have made that “majority rules, no matter what” begs that the questions be asked and answered. While no one may cry that the child pornographers and rape fantasizers are vanishing today, what will happen when the unopposed Morality Police grows fangs tomorrow?

How long will it be before any sort of “inappropriate” sexual activity is outlawed by Second Life? Will we see a ban on expressions of sodomy? Sexual activity outside of wedlock? Will it become illegal for “partnerships” to be declared in Second Life between two avatars of the same gender? Will furries be outlawed as “bestiality” when in reality they are promoting nothing of the sort?

What happens if two people are in private, inaccessible land and an opportunistic voyeur disables their camera constraints, zooms into their private home and spies on them consensually participating in some “unaccaptable” activity that they have by all rights taken every precaution to hide from the public eye so as not to violate the “rules?” Will they, too, be tracked down, have their land seized, and be burned at the stake?

You need to be very, very careful about how you proceed with this, LL. You’re starting to venture out onto the slipperiest slope of all and swinging the axe of moderation on the internet … a place known and loved for its uninfringed freedom of speech and expression.

-Onyx Syakumi
June 2, 2007

[11:21] Robin Linden: I can't speak in generalities. We have not found any reason to ban Goreans or BDSM. 

[11:22] Jazhara Keon: Goreans and BDSM include forced scenes, explicit violence and sexuality.. all points that have been explicitly mentioned in last bpost being FORBIDDEN, as where it first was to be in areas rated (M)ature... 
[11:22] Summer Seale: agreed. jazhara is hitting th enail on the head. 
[11:22] Ravena DeCuir: robin would it be possibl #e to cordinate all these questions through you 
[11:23] Summer Seale: and, quite frankly, some of us want to know *before* we get banned for something that was 'okay' one day, and 'not okay' the next. 
[11:23] Robin Linden: No, but I'll get you a place to ask your questions. 

[11:33] Robin Linden: We have tried to create a world where everyone takes responsibility for their own actions, within some broadly stated guidelines called the communitiy standards. 

[11:33] Robin Linden: We've relied on the Residents to let us know when those standards are violated. 
[11:34] Robin Linden: Nevertheless, as we've grown and as we've spread out across the globe in RL, there are different sensibilities that we face in different places. 
[11:34] Robin Linden: This is a new situation for us, and one we have to navigate through. 
[11:34] Robin Linden: We would like to maintain our approach where the community lets us know when they believe the community standards have been violated. 
[11:34] Robin Linden: Hence the reminder to use the reporting system. 
[11:35] Nobody Fugazi: Query: If someone AR's me for being broadly offensive, am I informed and do I have rights? 
[11:35] Astarte Artaud: But we never know what action is taken half the time 
[11:35] Jessica Holyoke watches Robin's hands 
[11:35] Robin Linden: That said, we may find there are times when behaviors that we have allowed in the past, e.g. ageplay, are viewed strongly enough by some jurisdictions that we have to decide, for the sake of the business 
[11:35] Sarah Nerd: It would just be easier if the community standards were a bit more clear, and we didnt have to test the waters to learn whats acceotable and what wasnt 
[11:35] Robin Linden: that we aren't going to allow them any more. 
[11:35] Bella Wilberg: how many AR's are needed to even be looked at? 
[11:35] Jessica Holyoke: I don't think she's done yet 
[11:35] Robin Linden: I doubt very much that ageplay is the last behavior that will come under this scrutiny. 
[11:36] Tao Takashi: maybe it's really not so much the question of what is bad but what happens after you have been reported 
[11:36] Lewis Nerd: i think the basic question is this: does daniel's post change what is acceptable, or was it just badly worded? 
[11:36] Robin Linden: What Daniel said in his post is that we have standards, we have a reporting system, and we need to work together to try to maintain those standards. 

[11:39] Robin Linden: The reason I can't say that this or that activity, or slant on BDSM, or degree of forced sex is or isn't allowed is because I don't know the answer. 
[11:39] Jessica Holyoke: Was there a specific inquiry? 
[11:39] Very Susanti: I suspect community outcry will be the guide 
[11:39] Robin Linden: For now I would say use your heads, live by the laws of your own jurisdiction, try not to be in other people's faces with activities that you know might draw ciriticism in the RW 
[11:40] Estella Jimenez: would like to say that forced sex is impossible in SL you need to consent to being animated and if anyone does something you dont like you can mute them and leave with a teleport or logout 

[11:25] Robin Linden: Let me ask you all this. When faced with an opportunity to create a new world where things are supposed to be better, do you think there's a place for slavery, forced sex, and the like? 
[11:25] Summer Seale: sometimes. it depends on what your kink is. =) 
[11:25] otakup0pe Neumann: Robin : if that's what floats their boat, that's why there are private sims. 
[11:25] Nobody Fugazi: everything here is voluntary. 
[11:25] Ciaran Laval: Forced sex? No, consenting forced sex, yes 
[11:26] otakup0pe Neumann: Not on the "mainland" and not "in my backyard" 
[11:26] Jessica Holyoke: But that's all apart of our personalities, if the promise is "your world, your imagination" vs. "someone else's utopia" 
[11:26] Stephen Zenith: nobody can be forced into sex here 

[11:49] Nobody Fugazi: My major concern remains the lack of transparency involved with precedents of the abuse report system as well as allowing people recourse when they are abuse reported and may not know. 
[11:49] otakup0pe Neumann: I disagree, but yes, it needs to be made public. 
[11:49] Robin Linden: extreme violence implies extreme, disgusting, beyond-the-pale imagery, such as rotten.com-style images of violent death, not videogame-style carnage 

[11:53] Robin Linden: The more likely scenario, however, is that Residents will join together to create local regions where they agree on rules. In that case our role... 
...
[11:54] Robin Linden: ...becomes more one of oversight. When the day comes that the group can host their own servers, then they can do whatever they want and answer directly to their local authorities.